Fog
by hedgehoginatutu
Summary: Post-epilogue, third toast baby head canon. Katniss doesn't cope well with change and Peeta doesn't cope well with a broken Katniss. TW difficult pregnancy.


Summary: Post-epilogue. Katniss doesn't cope well with change and Peeta doesn't cope well with a broken Katniss.

Notes: So this is what I call third-toast-baby-head-canon. I know there are a few other people that believe in the third toast baby and this is my take on it. I hope you enjoy this. I wrote it for day 7 of Prompts in Panem's 'Peeta's Paint Box' challenge. The prompt was black and white and I chose to represent that through Peeta's attacks.

Word count: 4,730

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><p>The exhaustion was blamed on the summer heat. The low-mood was blamed on a relapse that must have occurred in the months and weeks preceding the day her youngest child would start school. The vomiting was put down as an auto-immune response to being alone for 7 hours a day.<p>

Dr Mavor, who had arrived in District 12 six years after the war, knew Katniss and our family well. She had delivered both Willow and Rye and had been responsible for Katniss' medication for almost two decades.

Despite this she still missed all the signs that Katniss herself picked up on. But Katniss was stubborn and if Katniss didn't want to be pregnant, then Katniss would not be pregnant.

I don't know how long she knew until she finally broke down and told me that she needed another doctor's appointment but when we got the confirmation from Dr Mavor Katniss lay on the exam table in frozen silence.

I squeezed her hand but she didn't react.

"Another one," I whispered gently and scraped some loose strands of hair behind her ear as I leant in to plant a chaste kiss on her lips.

Her lips were dry and chapped and didn't respond at all.

"You knew for a while, didn't you?" She must have known, she was twelve weeks gone and her mood of late had been foul.

She doesn't say anything but this seems to pull her out of her trance and she sits up and begins to adjust her clothes and pull her boots back on.

"Are- Are you happy?"

Her eyes were dark and I noticed how sunken her cheeks looked. She had been very ill and it wouldn't surprise me if she had lost weight since conceiving our third child. She still didn't turn to me and it struck me that no, she was not happy. She had never been happy with me. She had only carried our two other children out of some twisted obligation to me because she felt responsible for what had happened. She pitied me. She didn't love me. And she certainly never expected to be forced to carry a third child.

She didn't even want the first two. She never said it but I knew it. Or someone knew it. He was in my head screaming about the way her eyes were sometimes completely dead when she watched them playing outside in our garden. I remembered all of the times that she had disappeared into the woods without so much as a warning that she was going. She was always too happy to leave me alone with the children. She resented them. I knew it. She wished they had never been born. She wished that this baby wasn't on its way.

"Peeta?" Her voice and gentle hand on my tense shoulder was what silenced the voice in my head. I realized I was gripping onto the back of the chair I had been sitting on and was staring at the floor with every muscle in my body tensed.

"Sorry," I mumbled and didn't look up at her and tried to crush the wood between my hands for a little while longer until I felt like I had complete control back.

"You know, it's not that I'm not happy," she begins quietly. "I just don't like the idea yet."

"You don't like the idea of our child Katniss?" My voice was a lot angrier than I intended and I didn't even know what made me say it. I knew that she was vulnerable in that moment and I knew that she needed time.

"I thought we were done," she whispers and I can see the fear in her eyes and I have to clutch the chair again to stop myself from touching her.

"You don't like the idea of Willow or Rye?" I snap at her again. "That's what this is Katniss, you wishing this away is like wishing one of them-"

"Stop it!" She suddenly shouted back and that was maybe what I needed to break the hallucination.

When her face comes back into focus and her eyes fade from red to gray I can see that she is crying.

"I am sorry," I whisper. "Real." I move towards her, giving her plenty of opportunity to say no as I wrap her in my arms.

"I love it already Peeta. It's just that I was already past thirty-five with Rye and you know how complicated that got. Now I'm past forty and I just don't want anything-" I cut her off with a soft kiss to her dry lips which she actually returns this time.

Just like the last two times Katniss refused to tell anyone before everyone had figured it out for themselves. Haymitch had possibly known before even me and I saw the looks he gave Katniss every so often in the weeks following the confirmation by Dr Mavor.

I never trusted the looks that went on between Katniss and Haymitch. They had their own language of raised eyebrows and pointed stares that concealed their agenda.

It was almost three weeks after I found out that Haymitch said anything. Katniss had regained her appetite and a little bulge had begun to form around her midriff. Katniss always found the earliest stages of showing the most difficult. I thought the little growth in her stomach was adorable and I had tried to tell her so with Willow but she had shot me down and shoved my hand away in terror and spent the rest of the day in the bath with the shower running over her. She had been less agitated during her pregnancy with Rye and had placed my hand on her stomach myself when she caught me gazing at the little bump forming. I knew this time was different. Even with Willow we had planned for it to happen, but this time she had had none of that preparation and it seemed like everything was happening against her will.

"So there's gonna be another mouth to feed," Haymitch had stated one evening around fifteen weeks when he was over for dinner, having run out of clean crockery in his own kitchen.

Katniss froze and refused to raise her eyes from the table.

"More geese?" Willow asked excitedly. "Can I name them?" Her blue eyes had widened and she was practically bouncing out of her seat.

"Call it Duck," Rye pitched in. "Like the game!"

Haymitch rolled his eyes. "No more damn geese," he muttered.

"Haymitch," I said curtly and he nodded his apologies at the profanity but his eyes were fixed on the top of Katniss' head which was still resolutely facing her plate."

"So Sweetheart, something to tell us all or are you gonna wait until it starts school?"

"Can I take one of the geese to school?" Rye piped up. "We have show-and-tell on Monday."

"No buddy," I shake my head at Rye, but keep my eyes on Katniss. "Why don't you take the sea shells that Fin sent you?" Rye is happy with this suggestion and goes back to his squirrel meat.

Katniss still hasn't moved since Haymitch broached the subject.

"Little mistake, sweetheart?"

I reached out to take Katniss' hand under the table because I was sure she was close to breaking point by now, but it was met by a short, sharp slap.

A fucking mistake. Of course that's what it was to her and Haymitch; just another mouth to feed; just another person to worry about; just another tool to be used against us. That's how they both saw this baby, a lamb to the slaughter. Couldn't they see that things were different now?

"Peeta!"

Why couldn't she be happy? Were Willow and Rye just mouths for her to feed too? She only had them because I wanted them. She said that she had never wanted any children. I remember the day that she first took Willow into the forest to hunt.

"Peeta?"

Willow had come back in tears and Katniss had been in a foul mood and had stormed upstairs and shut herself in the spare room. She didn't seem to understand why Willow was so upset about the rabbit meat for dinner that evening as if she expected our daughter, who had never experienced the same hunger as us, to be able to callously kill for food.

"Daddy?"

Willow's voice brought me back. Her little fingernails were digging into my hands, which she was trying to pry off the back of the chair that I had been sitting on. Katniss was standing right beside me with tears in her gray eyes. She had her arm around me and was helping me to keep my balance. Something was off. My good leg was spasming.

"Just my leg," I grunted and shook it a little.

Rye was staring up at me wordlessly and Haymitch might even have looked a little remorseful. Katniss told Willow to go and get me some iced water and she helped me back into my seat.

Her eyes were searching mine, but I couldn't hold her gaze for too long. That was the second in a month. I hadn't had them this frequently in a long time and certainly not in Willow or Rye's lifetimes.

"Here you go Daddy," Willow thumped the glass of water on the table a little haphazardly before climbing into my lap. She held my face between her hands and smooshed my cheeks before giving me a kiss.

Rye laughed hysterically at his sister's display and ran around the table to join in. Haymitch guffawed and shook his head muttering something about Willow having me on a string, while helping himself to the food abandoned on the children's plates. Katniss still looked a little wary but she was smiling as Rye climbed into her lap and gave her the same treatment Willow had just given me.

Their gray eyes twinkled together as they both laughed at the silly game and she ruffled his curls. I felt a stab of guilt as I watched them remembering the thoughts that had clouded my mind moments before. I had been living with Katniss for well over twenty years now and with every single change that had been made in our lives Katniss had needed time. She scowled every time she set foot in the kitchen for a whole month after the mixer Effie had sent us as a wedding present was set up permanently on the counter by the window. Change wasn't something she readily accepted. Maybe she just needed more time.

The kids finally got back in their own seats with the promise of dessert. Lemon and passion fruit chiffon cake was one of Katniss' favorites and the reason she had first accepted for the presence of the mixer on the kitchen counter.

I was watching Rye bend down to the table top to lick the cream off the outside of the cake when I felt Katniss' hand on my arm. She was smiling and I smiled back.

"Now?" She asked softly and I grinned before I nodded.

"Mama and I have something we want to tell you," I began and Haymitch let his dessert fork fall with a clatter and he leaned forward as if intently listening, but actually mocking the whole situation. I resolutely focused in on Willow and Rye's cream covered faces. "We're going to have another baby brother or sister soon."

Rye smiled widely and Willow looked as though she was still considering the news.

"Can I take it to show-and-tell?" Rye was beaming in anticipation and looking between me and Katniss.

"Well not this Monday," Katniss smiled. "He or she should be here in mid-spring."

"Next Monday?" Rye asked.

"Don't be stu-" Willow stopped when she saw the stern look Peeta was giving her. "Don't be silly, first fall has to end and then winter, and then it will be spring. Babies take forever to get here," Willow sighs. "Can you ask for a sister this time?"

"Well, it doesn't really work like that," I start, "but it might be a girl."

"If it's a girl can we call it Willow?"

"Rye!" Willow scowls. "I'm called Willow."

"But then I could have two sisters called Willow." Katniss, Haymitch, and I exchange confused looks but Rye beams up at us. "I like having one sister called Willow, so I think two would be better." I watch Katniss' eyes tear up a little as I feel my own heart swelling.

"Maybe we can think of an even better name for the new brother or sister, huh?" I suggest.

Rye shrugs but seems unconvinced that there could possibly be a better name. "Where do you get the baby from?"

Haymitch laughs heartily, but Willow steps in with her expert knowledge. "Mama grows it in her tummy and then she goes to Dr Mavor and she takes it out."

"In your tummy?" Rye looks at Katniss in horror.

"Yup," Katniss grins at his shock. "It's in here right now," she pats her little bump affectionately and I feel my heart swelling again.

"Can you feel it yet, Mama?"

"A little bit, but only on the inside, not on the outside yet."

"Will you tell me when I can feel it?"

The questions continue all night, long after Haymitch has excused himself to head home. We are still being questioned as we climb into bed with the new baby's older siblings who are far too excited to sleep in their own beds.

The last utterance I hear on the matter before I drift off to sleep is Rye telling Katniss to wake him up if the baby decides to arrive during the night.

We don't have to worry about making it through the winter but Katniss still insists on filling up the ice box in November, just in case. It's the last time I will allow her to go hunting until the baby gets here. She's approaching 5 months and by the time the snow and ice melt she will be near bursting.

So we have the kind of winter we could only have dreamed of as children growing up in 12. The season is one of the bakery's busiest. People like to order sweet breads and cookies for the winter festivals and despite the growth of all businesses and the expansion of the district nobody ever set up a second bakery so it all falls to me. Part of me is dreading Willow and Rye growing up, but another part is looking forward to when they will be a help rather than a hindrance in the Bakery's kitchen.

That is where we spend the majority of the school's winter break. Katniss has always helped me out over the winter in the bakery, but since Willow and Rye have been toddling around she has spent most of her time in the bakery undoing whatever chaos our children release.

I enjoy the last day we spend together in the bakery before school starts back. It's quieter, than the rest of the break had been. Once I finished closing up the front of the bakery I came into the back where Willow stood at the center island practicing piping onto baking sheets. Over the winter holidays she had refined her piping skills so much that I let her take over complete decoration of the sugar cookies when she felt like it. I didn't want her to feel like she had to, but she enjoyed it and took her task very seriously and even washed up her own dishes.

Katniss was seated on the bottom step of the staircase that led to the apartment above the bakery, that I had never lived in, with Rye tucked in at her side against her swollen stomach as she read to him from a book set in pre-Panem times.

I helped Willow clean up and then I helped Katniss to her feet. We left the junior bakers to do the next day's prep work and headed home with a box of surprises for after dinner. It was a long walk through the snow and it was frightfully cold. Rye complained the whole way about how the cold made everything hurt and I would have given in and carried him if I hadn't been so worried about Katniss and her disturbed center of gravity loosing their footing.

"Brrrrrrrrrrrrrr!" Rye ran inside stripping out of his sodden layers and running for the kitchen hearth.

Willow was scowling at the cold too and followed her little brother to hearth picking up his dropped articles of clothing as she went.

"We really should just move into the bakery for the winter," I pressed a kiss to Katniss' lips as I helped her off with her own layers.

"One way to assure Haymitch dies of hypothermia," Katniss grinned cheekily.

I chuckled. "So, shall I break out the deer meat we've got stored? Celebrate the last night without homework for a while?"

"Yes sure," Katniss nods. "But do you mind if I take a lie down?"

"No of course," I smile and let my hand rest on her distended belly. "Whatever you got to do to keep this one happy. Shall I bring you a plate?"

"No, no, call me down, I just need a little lie down. A whole day with Rye really wears me out. I didn't really used to do this all day every day, did I?"

"And you get to do it for another five years," I promise her and rub gentle circles on her belly.

She chuckles and heads upstairs to rest.

The kids help with the vegetables and setting the table while I prep the meat and get some cheese buns going. Haymitch appears shortly before I start serving and goes to terrorize the children, who were playing quietly in the living room.

I go up to fetch Katniss but she appears to be in a deep sleep so I leave her a plate of cheese buns at the side of the bed and head back downstairs. The four of us have a lovely meal and Haymitch finds it hard to hide how impressed he is at dessert when Willow presents him with a selection of cookies that she iced herself.

There's still no sign of Katniss after dinner so I got the kids bathed and into their beds before I check on her again. I smile when I see she is still fast asleep and hasn't even undone her braid.

I slide into bed with her and gently start to undo her hair. She stirs a little and snuggles as close as our third child will allow her. I kiss her crown and continue to undo her hair until I can smoothly run my fingers through it.

I set the alarm so that the kids will have plenty of time to get ready for school and then I take Katniss more fully into my arms as we settle down to sleep.

It was a strange sensation that wakes me up. It was a damp sticky sensation against my legs and my first thoughts flashed me back to my teenage years sharing a bedroom with my brothers . As I woke up, I remembered that I was a grown man with two children and a pregnant wife.

Katniss was still tucked in at my side and her chest continued to rise and fall, but there was no question over where the warm, sticky, damp feeling was coming from.

"Katniss!" I pulled back the bedclothes and scrambled for a light switch. Sure enough, spreading out from Katniss' thighs is a dark red stain.

It was what she wanted. She wanted this to be over. She didn't wan-

"Not real, not real, not real," I fight as the scene before me has my mind hurtling through a thousand different blodd stained memories, none of which I can really trust; Katniss standing over Rue's body with a raised bow and arrow; Katniss pointing her bow and arrow at me; Katniss refusing to have children over and over again. The tears my begging had caused, the nights she had spent crying under the shower refusing to become a mother. That scowl. I couldn't-

"Not real! Not real! Not real!" I was shouting when I realized where I was and Katiss was stirring with a moan and immediately her hands went to her stomach. "K-, Katniss, d-, don't worry," I gasped and stumbled away in search of the telephone.

Dr Mavor made it to our house in less than half an hour thanks to the car she had been given to help transport patients around the district.

I knelt behind Katniss, with her head in my lap as Dr Mavor examined her.

"It's going to be OK Katniss, I promise," I whispered against her ear.

"You, you can't promise that," she cried. "I- I told you we shouldn't have let this happen, I'm too old! I can't look after her!"

There is was again, she just said it herself. We shouldn't have let this happen. This child, our child, was still just a mistake to her. She wanted out of our marriage, she wanted away from me. She wanted me to be gone. She didn't want any reminders.

"Mr Mellark, come on. Mr Mellark, no! No!"

"Peeta!"

She had done this on purpose. She tried to get rid of our child. My child, not hers, even if she didn't want it I did. She hurt herself to try and get rid of our child. She had done the same with Willow. I could see Katniss covered in blood standing in the kitchen several months pregnant. She was laughing.

No, that couldn't be right. Willow was here. Willow was safe. I couldn't place it, but I knew it had happened. She stood in the kitchen with blood all over her and she laughed.

Haymitch had been there, but Willow had been safe. I knew it wasn't real.

"Not real, not real, not real," I mutter it again. "I am Peeta Mellark. I am forty-one years old. I was in the Hunger Games with Katniss. She was my ally. We saved each other. We went back into the arena and the Capitol captured me. I was tortured and they affected my memories. I live in District 12 with Katniss and she loves me. She said 'real.' We have two children and one more on the way that we both love dearly."

I'm in the bathroom. I don't remember coming in here. The door is unlocked, but I can't get it open.

"Katniss!" I call out to her in panic. "Dr Mavor?"

The door opens and I see Haymitch.

"Mavor took her over to the medical center. She said if you're stable you should call and she'll send someone over to pick you up. I'll stay here with the kids."

"What, what did she say? Are they OK?"

"She just said she had to work fast," Haymitch clapped his shoulder. "You get going and let me know as soon as you have news, alright? Don't worry about these two, I'll keep 'em busy."

"Sure."

By the time I got to the medical center Katniss was already in one of the operating theaters and Dr Mavor was about to begin a surgery she claims was very common in the Capitol and the closer districts. Through her anesthetic muddled mind Katniss mumbled something about her mother and I let her grasp my hand.

One of Delly's eldest daughters who trained as a nurse appeared in the room along with a man I vaguely recognized from my own visits to the medical center.

It takes less than 30 minutes from the moment they begin to the moment I see my youngest child.

"Another girl Mrs Mellark," Carolina cooed as the man I didn't recognize swept our daughter away.

"Wh- where are they-"

"She's a little early, Mrs Mellark," Carolina spoke with a soft voice, just like Delly and I wondered if that was the only reason they sent her to our room. "Dr Crawford is just going to see to it that she gets the best care we can give her, OK?"

"No," Katniss shook her head, still muddled through all the medication. She's pushing at my arm. "Go, you have to go Peeta! We can't leave her, go!"

I was torn in that moment. Dr Mavor said the bleeding was under control, but Katniss' eyes are out of focus and she just had a major surgery.

"I promise you Mr Mellark," Dr Mavor fixed me with a stare. "Everything here is going to be fine. If you want to be with your daughter, go. As soon as I finish here with Katniss I will roll her bed along too and you can all be together."

It took a while. It took longer than the rest of the pregnancy would have, but by the end of April Ivy finally got to come home with us.

Willow and Rye hadn't been allowed to visit in the medial center and were both over flowing with excitement to meet her.

They hung a banner with Haymitch and Effie's help that read 'Welcome home Ivy' across the fireplace. Effie had arrived when she heard how much time we were leaving the children alone with Haymitch. She said it simply wouldn't do. She arrived from the Capitol with suitcases over flowing with gifts for her favorite children and an entirely pink wardrobe for Ivy. Katniss had been rendered speechless by the numerous pink outfits, but luckily Effie had taken it as being overwhelmed by gratitude rather than breathless from silent laughter.

Effie was well meaning and Willow and Rye had gotten used to this strange woman and even loved her as much as they did Haymitch.

"Can I hold her?" Willow began clamoring the instant the door closed.

"Me too!" Rye squealed hurtling at Katniss' legs and reaching up for the bundle cradled against her chest.

"Woah, buddy!" I scoop him up before he can dislodge his sister. "You've got to be extra gentle, yeah?"

"OK, but please can I hold her?" He begged.

"Me first!" Willow scowled and stomped her foot. "I'm the oldest, so I've been waiting the longest!"

"There's going to be lots of chances to hold Ivy, she's staying here for good," Katniss eases herself and Ivy down onto the sofa. "If you both come here you can try holding her."

Willow sits on Katniss' left and she gently passes Ivy into Willow's arms. "Now make sure her head is well supported or she gets hurt."

"I know, I was a big sister before, remember?"

"But I never got to be a big sister," Rye whines. "Mama, please can I hold her now?"

"You get to be the big brother," Katniss pulls him up into her lap. "How does that sound?"

"Can I take her to show-and-tell?"

"We'll see," I sigh and kneel down in front of Willow. "Maybe in the last week of term when she's a bit bigger."

"My arms hurt, it's Rye's turn," Willow announces and I gently lift Ivy from her big sister's arms. Katniss adjusts Rye in her lap so that she can still offer support to Ivy's head when I lay her down in his arms.

Rye's eyes widen and a big smile breaks over his face and I want to remember that smile forever. I have no doubt that as soon as we pass the newborn phase of sleepless nights and sleepless days it will be the first thing I paint: Rye in Katniss' arms with Ivy between them and Willow snuggling up at the side.

I could never have imagined anything this perfect a couple of months ago as Katniss and I sat by in agony watching Ivy fight for every breath. I couldn't have imagined anything this perfect even during the reconstruction of 12, and certainly not during or before the war.

No, the familial bliss that I had come to call my own was the sort that I couldn't have imagined since that very first day of school when everything was still possible and Katniss Everdeen had stood on a stool in the music room in a red plaid dress with two braids instead of one and sang the Valley Song.

Notes: End note hilarity. I just want to say that the mixer thing might sound trivial, but my ex-boyfriend moved out after a fight over where we thought the mixer should live. I maintained the counter because we didn't have much cupboard space and it made it difficult to get other things out of the cupboard, especially if you need a stool to reach the cupboards in the first place. My ex-boyfriend maintained it belonged in the cupboard. And that was the end of that. So Peeta and Katniss keep theirs on the counter, although I think Katniss' objection is more to Capitol technology than the counter space real estate.

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><p>Notes: Thanks for reading, and as a reward for making to the end I'm going to tell you something very embarrassing. The bit about the mixer and change was a real life situation that led to my ex-boyfriend becoming my ex-boyfriend. We only had one cupboard in our kitchen big enough to store it and that cupboard was very high up. Having the mixer in that cupboard made it impossible to find anything else in the cupboard so I liked to leave it out on the counter. My ex-boyfriend liked it in the cupboard. I feel Katniss' objections in this story are more to do with Capitol technology, but I drew on my own feelings of fury when my ex used to move the mixer. Life can be stupid.<p> 


End file.
